I wanted some candles out on the patio, but I had gotten some earlier and forgot that I lived in south Florida so they spent the entirety of the time they were out there in a liquid state. It wasn’t pretty. So when I spotted this oil lantern at Walmart for about $5 I went for it. But…I wanted it to be prettier. So this is how you go about making it that way:

Start with that sweet looking lantern right there

Get bored the night before you were going to do this project and spray paint the whole thing at 10pm. [after you remove the glass]

While the body of the lantern is drying take some acrylic craft paint in the same color of your lantern and water it down a ton. Then paint the outside of the glass piece. I ended up washing off this coat here, watering it down more and repainting.

Slightly yellow color. Why? I don’t know, but every vintage lantern I’ve seen has a coloring to the glass similar to the coloring of the lantern body. So might as well.

Pop that glass back in and make sure all the moving parts can still move. You’re done.

I can say with certainty that this is not a good project for someone who is a perfectionist. There are parts of my lantern that aren’t painted perfectly but I don’t mind, I actually prefer it that way. So, know that it won’t look flawless, but it will look amazing.

other option

Anyway, a few days after I finished the lantern I got an email from Briana who was hanging out with me while I painted this lantern. She found this at Anthropolgie for $40. So, if you like the look but would prefer to spend 8 times as much, you can!

What are you painting?
xoxo,
Adora